Devotions with Lecrae: Used to Do it Too

The more I listen to Lecrae (and a few other Christian rappers, including Trip Lee) I'm struck by the theology and the message in their music.  Christian rap has come a long way in the last few years. Not too long ago it was really poor, but these guys that are big now not only have great messages, their beats and lyrical skills are great too.

This morning I was thinking about the message in Lecrae's song "Used To Do it Too" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tjuuy9deEc).  A few lines in parts of the song specifically caught my ear.

The intro to the song goes like this:

Some folks think they mistakes, gonna keep them out the gates (Heaven). It ain't about what YOU do, it's about what HE did. 

So from the get go Lecrae has us focusing on what is important, Jesus sacrifice to save us from our sins; forgiveness.

The chorus of the song goes like this:

I used to do it too, I used to do it too, I used to do it, used to do it, used to do it too. I'm changed, now I'm something different. I'm changed, I love the way I'm living. I'm changed, saved me from my own sin. I'm changed, I learned how to live again.  

Later on he references Colossians 2 directly, and seems to be rapping straight out of Romans 8. Both are passages dealing with freedom from sin, freedom from the rule of the flesh, and being free in the Spirit. One can also find reference to Romans 6, where Paul says we must die to sin and become slaves to righteousness.

In the later verses of the song, Lecrae talks about his sin, saying: "you name it, I promise I done it all, so busy doin' me, I ain't care at all," which describes all of our lives in sin. We're selfish, sinful beings, we sin over and over.  Lecrae ends that verse with this line, which is one of my favorites:

But I ain't fix myself, ain't turn myself around. I gave it up and told the Lord that He can have it now

What a powerful statement of what we do in living for Christ. We commit to giving over our sin and becoming slaves to righteousness. We die, and are made new.  Praise the Lord

I love listening to Lecrae's music. I can enjoy it for it's musical quality, but it also reminds me constantly of the joys of being a Christ-follow, and the commitment that entails.

Gratitude and Willingness

Today in Church out preacher  preached on Romans 12:9-21.  The passage begins with "Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good."  It goes on to list a number of things that a mature Christian should do in the way they live their life. In the message, our preacher focused on verse 16, which says: "Live in harmony with one another.  Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited."  The phrase "be willing to associate with people of low position" is also translated "be willing to do menial work," which is what our preacher focused on this morning.

Sincere love means being willing to do anything for someone.  If someone tells us that they would be willing to do literally anything for us, of course we should be very thankful, we would show great gratitude towards them.  While people are selfish and sinful and probably at some point would fall short of literally doing ANYTHING for us, Jesus came to earth and did exactly that.  He suffered and died in order to save us from our sins.  Nobody else in the history of the world has shown the love that Jesus showed us, giving not just "anything," but EVERYTHING for us.  John 15:13 says: "Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends."

If God loves us THAT much, and sacrificed THAT much, then clearly our gratitude should be displayed in our everyday life.  We should live each an every second of our life as an act of gratitude towards our Lord.  One point that our preacher made was that gratitude leads to willingness.  If we show gratitude for what God has done for us, then we will not be proud and we will "be willing to do menial work" (Romans 12:16).  If God calls us to do something, we should do it. Sometimes the things that God calls us to are not things that bring us glory, or wealth, or fame.  The things God asks us to do aren't always easy, in fact often they are not easy.  Think of missionaries who leave their families, friends and the comforts of home behind to go out and spread God's word around the world, often in places where living conditions are not exactly comfortable.  But it's not about us.  This life is about giving God the glory and living to serve Him.  To show our gratitude, we must respond to God's call with an emphatic "YES!"

It's one of the things I pray every day, that I would hear God's call and have the courage to follow, wherever it may lead.

Playing the background, wisdom from Lecrae

Last night I took my sister Kassi to a Lecrae concert for her birthday.  For those who don’t know Lecrae, look him up. He’s a Christian rapper and he’s legitimately good.  Not only can the man rap, the man can preach, and he often does them at the same time.  A number of artists performed leading up to Lecrae.  They were all pretty good and each had a good message to share about the impact Christ has had on their lives and the power of Christ’s love, grace and forgiveness.  However, it was Lecrae who brought the house down with his beats and rhythms, and it was Lecrae who truly brought the message home. 

All of Lecrae’s songs have a clear gospel message.  He and a group of rappers signed with his record label are know as the 1-1-6 Clique, named for Romans 1:16, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes: first to the Jew, then to the Gentile.”  Throughout his performance Lecrae paused a number of times in between songs to reflect on the message of a particular song or to re-focus the night on giving God the glory. 
One song that particularly spoke to me was called “Background.” (If I set it up right, it’s playing on this page.  If not, here’s the you-tube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHnZRZiCYHE)  The chorus says:

I could play the background
I could play the background
Cause I know sometimes I get in the way
So won’t you take the lead, lead, lead?
So won’t you take the lead, lead, lead?
And I could play the background, background
And you could take the lead.

The message of the song is that we need to stop trying to live in the spotlight and we need to let God run the show.  Rather than trying to be in control and receive the credit for ourselves, we need to remember to step back, let God lead and walk in the steps he has laid out for us. 

There’s a line in the song that says “I end up confessing that I’m not that impressive, matter of fact I’m who I are, a trail of stardust leading to the superstar.”  That’s what we are, a trail of dust, leading to the superstar (God).  We are made in His image, we reflect His glory.  We are not here to serve ourselves or other men, rather we are here to serve our Lord Jesus Christ.  I know I love to receive credit for the good things that I do, but in that I’m missing the point of living for Christ.  To truly lay down my life and live for God I need to gratefully accept the background role to the greatest lead of all time, Jesus Christ.

I’m not here to accomplish my goals and get praised for my accomplishments.  I’m here to follow God’s call on my life and bring glory to His name through my each and every step. When we let God take the lead, He does amazing things in our lives and blesses us beyond measure.  However, letting God take the lead and in turn playing the background, does not mean sitting back and just watching God work.  God has purpose for us, and that means being proactive Christians.  Rather than sitting around waiting for God to act, we should act in a Christ-like manner, knowing full well that God is present in all things and will use all things for His purpose.

I pray that God would help me (and all of us) to see the areas in my life where I need to stop trying to play the lead role and let Him take the lead.   I pray that I would not sit idly by an wait for God to work, but that I actively follow God’s path, letting Him give me my cues and serving Him for His glory at all times. 

Commas (,) and Periods (.) and Easter Sunday

Yesterday in Church our pastor preached on the resurrection.  That seems obvious, as it was Easter Sunday, except for the fact that the main scripture for the sermon was the resurrection of Lazarus, not that of Jesus. He focused most of his sermon on John 11, where Lazarus gets sick, yet Jesus does not go to him until after he has died, and Jesus resurrects him four days after Lazarus has died.

Our pastor made a few points that I want to touch on before getting to my main point. At one point he highlighted when Jesus says "Lazarus is dead, and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe."  On this verse our pastor brought up the fact that Jesus had done healings before, and that if Jesus went and healed Lazarus to prevent his death, there would always be a few people who would say "he wasn't really that sick" or "it was the doctor who saved him."  However, once Lazarus was dead, nobody could deny that it was an outright miracle performed by Jesus that brought Lazarus back from the dead.  He also said something else that I found interesting.  Our pastor added that maybe there are times when the situation doesn't call for a miracle. Perhaps Lazarus' being sick didn't call for a miracle, but his having died did.  He made the point that we want and expect God to do miracles in our lives, but we don't want to be in the situation that requires a miracle. Interesting point.

Our pastor also highlighted Martha's faith in the story.  In John 21:11, Martha says "Lord, if you had been here my brother would not have died. But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask." What incredible faith! Not only did she have faith that Jesus could have healed Lazarus had he come before Lazarus died, but she fully trusted that even after Lazarus' death, Jesus could ask God to resurrect him, and it would be done.  If only we could all live with that kind of faith.

I think what impacted me the most however was not something from scripture, but rather a point about the overall story that out pastor made.  In relation to this story, our pastor referenced a friend of his who once said "don't put commas where God puts periods, and don't put periods where God puts commas."  I particularly liked that last part, as it is incredibly applicable to this story and to our lives as Christians. In John 11 it would have been so easy to put a period after Lazarus' death. Lazarus dies, end of story.  As humans we'd tend to do that, but God put a comma there instead.  While we might expect the story to end there, God wasn't done, and he showed his incredible power again in resurrecting Lazarus from the dead.

I think this point is particularly applicable in our everyday life. We can't see what God has in store for us, and we don't know what God is doing, whether it be in the future or even how He is working in things that we are currently experiencing.  It's so easy for us to experience something and put a period after it. End of story.  I think that quite often we think something is over, and God is still working.  Too often God does something in our lives and we say "that was God working, thank you," and assume that the work is done and it's time to move to the next thing. However, God may still be working in that situation.  Even when we can't see it, God is always working.  When we think God is done, He may be just getting started.

So when something isn't going well, or doesn't appear to have worked out the way we'd like, let's remember that God works in mysterious ways, and we often don't understand or even realize how God has been working until long after He's done His work.  I think if we can all remember that God is always working and that we need to actively look for how He is doing that, we might just see things we didn't expect to see.

Let's leave the punctuation to God.

An Exercise in Patience and Trust

• Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. (Proverbs 3:5-6)
• Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. (Matthew 6:34)
• For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” declares the LORD(Jeremiah 29:11-13)
• For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Ephesians 2:10)

I've been trying to think of a time in my life when I felt less patient about life, or when there was less of a need to truly rely on God.  Of course, we always should truly rely on God, but it seems to me that as I inch closer to graduation, with my plans for next year still not clear, God seems to be repeatedly saying to me "Trust Me, let Me work this out, I have a plan, and My plans are perfect."  

I'm the kind of person who likes to know what is going on in my life, and I like to be in control of it. For the first time in my life I feel as if I have no control over what happens. I think when we reach a point like this in life, it's pretty clear that there is nothing to do but to look to God and say "You are God, you have created me for your work and your glory, you have prepared me to live for your Kingdom, now help me to follow wherever you would call me."  

As I think about my life up to this point, what I've learned, what I've done, where I've been, I feel like God has been preparing me all of my life to serve Him through pursuing a life of social justice, working for the poor around the world, giving a voice to the voiceless and following Christ's example of reaching out to the lost and the least in the world. I've studied, I've traveled, I've prayed and I've practiced.  God has prepared me. I am ready. 

And while I sit here saying "I'm ready, let's go save the world," God is saying "My time, not yours." I don't know God's time. I hope that it is soon, and it may be.  For now, I continue to search and pray, serving God where I am here and now, knowing that God calls us to serve Him wherever we are, and trusting that when He needs me, the call will come. 

The Last Few Weeks

It's been a couple of weeks since my last post, and for that I apologize. Basically I got busy at work, so I didn't have as much time there to write posts, and then with Kristen visiting me here in DC (which was amazing!) and other stuff going on blogging just kind of slipped my mind.

As I said, the last couple of weeks at work have been pretty busy. I've been doing a lot of research on issues related to the G8 Summit coming up this May in France.  I've written reports on Financial Levies, food security, I even wrote an article that will be published in next month's issue of Monday Developments (InterAction's monthly magazine).  I've also had the opportunity to go to some really interesting presentations and meetings, hearing a presentation at the World Bank on commodity price volatility, a presentation from the CEO of the Millennium Challenge Corporation (one of the main US government international development programs), and gone to a few House Foreign Affairs Committee Hearings.

One thing I've learned, or rather, been reminded of in the past few weeks is the need to rely on God. Those who know me know that I like to be in control of my life and be able to plan things out. Looking for jobs and figuring out what I'm going to be doing post-graduation (that's in May...WOW!) has reminded me that I can't always have everything figured out. With the difficulty in finding a job, and the uncertainty of the future, it's been easy for me to worry about that and think about it way too much. Thankfully, God keeps reminding me just to let go and trust that He will provide. An example of this happened this past Sunday in Church. During opening worship something got me thinking about jobs, and it had me really distracted from worship. I kind of snapped back to the song we were singing just as we sang the lines "You are God, you are God, of all else I'm letting go."  Things like that are the small ways in which God has been reminding me to trust Him and let Him provide for me and guide my steps. In the midst of uncertainty about finding a job it can be so easy to worry, but it is so comforting to know that God is in control and that He has a plan.

There have also been a significant number of political developments in the last few weeks, a number of them garnering national attention on the situation in Michigan. Some of those highlights include Governor Snyder passing the emergency financial powers law (I can't wait until he tries to use it and the whole state turns against him, followed by numerous court cases challenging what seems to be a fairly clearly unconstitutional law).  Another happened yesterday, when Governor Snyder signed a bill reducing the length of unemployment benefits, because apparently that is supposed to help create jobs (I don't see the logic there).

I'm hoping to have time soon to write some more on a variety of political issues, I guess that comes down to me making it more of a priority.

I hope all is well for all who are reading this.  To all of you back in Michigan I miss you guys a lot (that means you should visit me here in DC, because DC is an awesome city).